


Wicked Game

by Delphi



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Corporal Punishment, Dubious Consent, Gen, M/M, Revenge, Smut, Spanking, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-30
Updated: 2012-07-30
Packaged: 2017-11-11 02:11:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,507
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/473306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Delphi/pseuds/Delphi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Horace has his little ways of getting revenge on the uncooperative people in his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wicked Game

Horace Slughorn believed that revenge was a dish best served savoury and inviting with a sprinkling of broken glass on top. Outright unpleasantness simply could not compete in terms of cruelty and malice with conjuring an enemy's most secret and beloved dreams only to dash them. That was one of the many reasons that Horace paid close attention to those in his circle and maintained scrupulous mental notes on their preferences and peccadilloes. This habit made him unsurpassed when it came to choosing perfect, thoughtful Christmas gifts, and it also made a singular deliverer of petty vengeance.

For example: when Argus Filch forgot his place and stopped performing his duties to satisfaction, such as failing to prioritise a work order for a very annoying leaky tap in a professor's bathroom, Horace knew exactly how to deal with him.

"Argus, my good man!" He rapped sharply on the caretaker's office door. 

A chair scuffed back, and then heavy footsteps approached. The door opened a hand's breadth, and Argus's sour, suspicious face peeked out. 

Horace turned towards young Severus Snape, who was sulking behind him, grabbed the boy firmly by the collar, and presented him for disapproving inspection.

"I'm afraid we've had an infraction," he said, "and we're in need of your disciplinary expertise."

Argus's eyes widened and darted from Horace to the sullen boy, lingering on the latter with hunger. Then he stepped back and ushered them in with a grunt that sounded, to Horace's ear, deliberately disinterested. The door shut behind them with a hurried click. 

"What's his crime?" Argus asked.

"Out of bed after curfew," Horace said.

"I was only—" Snape began to protest for the eighth or ninth time, but Horace waved at him dismissively.

"Returning a library book to Madam Pince," Horace said generously, "so I think we can err towards leniency."

"Leniency?" Argus echoed, looking longingly at the cabinet on the wall, inside which Horace knew lay the relics of Apollyon Pringle's tenure at Hogwarts: the cane, the paddle, and the tawse. Headmaster Dippet had possessed a much better sense of humour about corporal punishment.

"I'm sure," Horace said, his voice carefully casual, "that in this case, a bare-handed spanking would be quite sufficient."

For a moment, he worried the man might actually swoon. Argus's eyes briefly glazed over before abruptly sharpening, making him look like a bull terrier who'd just had a bloody steak waved under his muzzle.

Snape straightened out of his dreadful posture and looked at them both in alarm from behind his lank curtain of hair. It seemed, Horace noted, that up until now he had thought the promise of a thrashing to be a bluff. 

Horace smiled reassuringly at the boy. It wouldn't do for Snape to unravel his plans this late in the game. While he doubted that many of his students went a day without bending the rules just a little, catching them at it was tricky business.

"If you've changed your mind, Severus, just say the word. I'm happy to deal with this matter privately to spare us the loss of house points, but if you'd rather I take this to the headmaster..."

"No!" Snape said. Then his shoulders slouched again, and his jaw jutted out stubbornly. "Let's just get it over with."

"That's the spirit," Horace said, picking up the chair from in front of the desk and pulling it back to the far wall. He sat down at an angle that afforded him a sideways view of the proceedings without making it appear as if he had purchased a front row ticket.

"Over the desk, boy," Argus croaked, his hands clenching and unclenching. "Robes up, drawers down."

Horace watched from the corner of his eye as the boy complied, drawing his robes up over skinny legs and then pushing down a worn pair of shorts that slipped down around his ankles. Severus then hiked up his robes the rest of the way and bent over the desk, burying his face in his folded arms. He had a surprisingly nice backside for such a meanly built young man. Pale and smooth and round—an unexpected bonus. 

"Twenty-five should do it, I think," Horace commented when a moment passed and Argus had done nothing but stare.

"Yessir," Argus murmured breathlessly.

Then, in an instant, the sharp crack of hand on bottom rang out.

" _Ah!_ " Snape shouted, the startled sound barely muffled against the desk.

A pause. Horace politely kept his eyes on the wall, knowing that Argus would be glancing guiltily his way before drinking in the sight of his handiwork. Would-be sadists really were a predictable lot. 

The next few smacks were doled out slowly but with just as much vigour. Snape had obviously clamped his jaw shut, or perhaps was biting down on his sleeve to keep back the most embarrassing of his cries, but they eked out nonetheless. 

Horace could see the appeal, academically at least, when he got a glimpse of the boy's backside. The previously milk-white globes had gone quite red, in violent contrast to his pale thighs. It was visually striking, and he imagined that the skin would be very hot to the touch. Of course, being of a more hedonistic bent, Horace would be inclined to drag a soothing ice cube over the abused flesh, letting it melt against the heat of the boy's skin, and then perhaps dipping it between his cheeks to make him gasp...

Now that was a pleasant image. Fortunately for his own composure, Snape hadn’t the face to sustain the fantasy for him, and Horace suspected a man like Argus would have other plans anyhow. Ones that likely involved further use of Snape's backside. He supposed—tamping firmly down on his own sense of titillation—that the attraction would be in feeling the burning skin against one's thighs and further distressing the flesh with every thrust, prompting fervent pleas and desperate whimpers and whatever else it was that excited the more savage breast.

" _Mnnn—!_ " 

Something had changed in the timbre of the boy's smothered cries. Horace frowned and let his gaze slide sideways. The obvious and sizeable tent in Argus's trousers had been anticipated. But that wasn't all there was to see. It was too shadowy between the desk and the drape of the boy's rucked-up robes to be entirely certain, but he would swear...

Oh my.

He listened keenly as Snape's little noises grew more urgent and wretched. Below it was the quickening pace of Argus's heavy breathing, punctuated by the series of smacks that grew to a flurry. 

Twenty-two by Horace's count. Twenty-three, twenty-four. Would Snape make it, he wondered with idle curiosity. 

Argus's arm drew back and delivered a final, brutal blow that drove the boy forward, and the choked, humiliated sound that slipped from Snape's throat answered the question in the affirmative. 

When the echo had faded, both caretaker and boy were panting. Horace daintily picked a bit of lint from his robes and smiled cheerfully. 

"Well, that takes care of that, gentlemen."

He watched with some amusement as Snape shakily got his pants up with a pained hiss—and as he scrubbed covertly at the desk with his sleeve, quickly blotting up the evidence of his enjoyment. His face was blotchy, and his dark eyes were shocked and brimming with tears.

"You can go now, Severus," Horace said. "Make sure to go straight to the dormitories, mind. We wouldn't want you to be late again."

Argus had retreated behind his desk, red to the ears and shaking his head in obvious disagreement as the office door opened and Snape slipped out. The caretaker’s cat sauntered in with an irritated trill. Horace gave her a kindly look and pulled up his chair. 

"As long as I have you here, Argus, I was hoping to discuss next year's Potions supplies."

"It's only February," Argus protested feebly, looking to the door as if he might force Horace out by will alone, or perhaps retrieve the boy by similar command. Then he let out an unmanly squeak as the cat hopped up into his lap.

"Oh, it's never too early to get a start on these things," Horace said, stifling a chuckle. "This might take an hour or two, but I'm sure you have nothing pressing."

There was a pause, and then some rudimentary understanding flashed across Argus’s face. "Got some repairs need doing," he said slowly. "Like that tap of yours?"

Horace affected an air of surprise. "You know, I’d quite forgotten about that. Thank you, Argus. I’d be most obliged if you were to take care of it. As soon as we’ve finished with this, that is."

Righteous contentment enveloped Horace's heart as Argus miserably pushed the cat out of his lap and picked up a quill to take down his requests. Horace checked off the balance in his mental ledger and then, after a moment's consideration, pencilled in another entry. _Severus Snape: fledgling masochist._

One never knew, after all, when a stray bit of trivia would come in handy.


End file.
